Letters to the editor, April 22, 2009

Tuesday

Apr 21, 2009 at 2:00 PMAug 21, 2013 at 10:14 AM

On objectivity ...

Were you looking for a lead paragraph for the Associated Press story on the tea parties (Desert Dispatch, April 16)? How about:"Tens of thousands of people staged 'tea parties' around the country Wednesday to protest the Obama administration's bailout and spending plans"?

Almost anything would have been more objective and fairer than the lead actually used:

"Whipped up by conservative commentators and bloggers, tens of thousands of protesters staged 'tea parties' around the country Wednesday to tap into the collective angst stirred up by a bad economy, government spending and bailouts."

Have you completely forgotten what objective journalism is? Have you utterly lost track of the distinction between news reporting and commentary? News flash: Your job is to give us, your readers, unbiased reporting of the news. News flash: You are not doing your job!

Patricia Morris, Barstow

On piracy ...

Here we go again. Somali pirates take more ships. If we had a government with any guts it could be stopped instantly. Why is it the lowest form of life can defy the world? It is a mystery to me why a sailor with a ball bat can't knock heads as they climb over the rail. Would this take any brain power. One PT boat or Black Hawk helicopter patrolling the area could stop the whole thing, but our government is afraid to do any thing. After all, we quit Korea, Vietnam, and Somalia. Now we can't handle a dozen pirates.

Guess we should ban more guns and let them have the world. Then we buy all of China's junk drywall and cry because we have no jobs. If people would buy American there would be plenty of jobs, but we buy the world's trash and take in their criminals as boarder crossers with no penalties. So what do we have? Just look at the crime reports and look at last names.

Now we have mailbox bombers. That is a federal offense. Why can't our all-powerful government put a stop to it? I can stop it easy with an OK by the law — no big deal.

No room for felons, no borders.

Why don't we just give the country to Mexico and be done with it? We have supported them since Pancho Villa. It is time to wake up and be Americans.